Posts Tagged ‘air raid shelters’

As part of our active discovery of Manchester and anything within a 30 mile radius of the city, on Sunday Sir Pubert and I decided to explore another level and headed underground. We went to Stockport to the air raid shelters that were set up prior to World War II. Stockport is built on sandstone, therefore allowing for some fairly easy digging and there is an extensive length of tunnels and shelters built underneath the city.

One of the shelters has been turned into a museum and you can walk through the tunnels learning about what life was like underground. The tunnels were used when significant bombings occurred in the area as well as during times of threat. It was difficult to imagine what it must have been like to spend time in these underground shelters, hoping you would come back out alive and with your house intact. The camaraderie that occurred amongst those who sought shelter was incredible and I wondered if this sort of compassion would happen today if we were all required to seek shelter in a hole in the ground.

Underneath Stockport.

The air raid museum was quite well done but the tunnels themselves are just worth seeing. They don’t have the same impact as the catacombs in Paris with the stacks of bones piled high as you walk through limestone underground graves, but the air raid shelters are a very special part of Stockport’s history.